Charles De Gaulle - Private Life

Private Life

Charles de Gaulle married Yvonne Vendroux on 7 April 1921. They had three children: Philippe (born 1921), Élisabeth (1924), who married General Alain de Boissieu, and Anne (1928–1948). Anne had Down's syndrome and died of pneumonia at the age of 20. De Gaulle always had a particular love for his handicapped daughter; one Colombey resident recalled how he used to walk with her hand-in-hand around the property, caressing her and talking quietly about the things she understood.

Like her husband, Yvonne de Gaulle was a conservative Catholic, and campaigned against prostitution, to stop pornography from being sold in newsstands and sex and nudity from being shown on TV, for which she earned the nickname "Tante ("Auntie") Yvonne." Later she unsuccessfully tried to persuade de Gaulle to outlaw miniskirts in France.

Charles de Gaulle had an older brother Xavier (1887-1955) and sister Marie-Agnes (1889-1983), and two younger brothers, Jaques (1893-1946) and Pierre (1897-1959). He was particularly close to the youngest, Pierre, who so resembled him that Presidential bodyguards often saluted him by mistake when he visited his famous brother or accommpanied him on official visits.

One of Charles de Gaulle's grandsons, also named Charles de Gaulle, was a member of the European Parliament from 1994 to 2004, his last tenure being for the National Front. Another grandson, Jean de Gaulle, was a member of the French Parliament until his retirement in 2007.

Famous quotes related to private life:

“In private life he was good-natured, chearful, social; inelegant in his manners, loose in his morals. He had a coarse, strong wit, which he was too free of for a man in his station, as it is always inconsistent with dignity. He was very able as a minister, but without a certain elevation of mind necessary for great good, or great mischief.”—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (16941773)